AEW Full Gear review: Everything everywhere all at once

Full Gear ended on Saturday with a dizzying array of talent doing things happening at such a breakneck pace that I still don’t fully know what happened.

The main event had Jon Moxley defeating Orange Cassidy thanks to help from Wheeler Yuta, who simply ran in and laid out Cassidy, allowing Moxley to win. It was a good main event, though there were better matches on the show. If you imagined this match in your head, you knew how it was going to go and you knew what the finish was. There were no frills, though there was plenty of blood, and a scary-looking back rake.

Then the end of the show happened. Try absorbing all of this.

Moxley continued to attack Cassidy with disinfectant of all things until Hangman Page made the save. Why? Who knows. This was a distraction for Christian Cage to come out and lay out Moxley in an attempt to cash in his title match. However, Jay White came out and attacked Cage. The Deathriders then attacked White as they made their exit. White grabbed a chair and stormed to the back, where the Deathriders were closing in on their truck. But then the truck was t-boned by a car driven, legit, by Darby Allin. Deathriders stole a car and left the arena as the show ended with Allin using his skateboard to destroy their car further.

Got all that? No? I don’t blame you.

Full Gear, an up and down show with a crowd struggling to react to anything, ended with a bunch of questions but not a lot of answers. Cage, a heel, is still teasing his wannabe Money in the Bank contract match. Hangman Page and Moxley had a staredown. Jay White I think wants a title shot. And Darby Allin, fresh off of being squashed last Wednesday, wants Moxley too. It feels like several months of Moxley challengers were all crammed into one ten minute segment that left people mystified rather than looking forward to what’s next. This all probably would have been better if the storylines were a little more cohesive and planned out better, and that can best sum up Full Gear as a whole.

There were good matches at least, two great ones in fact.

Bobby Lashley defeated Swerve Strickland in a simple but effective match, with Lashley defeating the AEW Champion decisively. Lashley should have won, as he needed a big win in his PPV debut.  I don’t know about Strickland losing at this point in time, however. Given The Hurt Syndicate’s attack on Prince Nana, the feud probably isn’t over, and I can see this continuing through the end of the year.

Konosuke Takeshita and Ricochet had a fine match where they did some cool things, but I expected more from the two, and the crowd simply didn’t care. Ricochet did a really cool space flying tiger drop at least. It’s kinda amazing this wasn’t as impressive as I thought it would be because I don’t remember the last Takeshita match that didn’t wow me, but here we are.

I liked Daniel Garcia winning the TNT title from Jack Perry as I felt like it was a long time coming for Garcia, who they’ve struggled to go with for most of the year. He finally won a big title in a pretty good match. Garcia has been booked well since making his return last month and now he feels like someone special that you can finally get behind. The opening video with Garcia’s mother beforehand was also a nice touch.

You would think on paper that the champagne celebration, live on pay-per-view, would lead to the return of Toni Storm. It did not. Instead Mariah May went to turn on Mina Shirakawa because, well, I guess she’s just really mean. Mina saw it coming, got mad, and attacked May, spearing her off the entrance ramp and through a table. Okay, so why on Earth was this on pay-per-view if it wasn’t meant to be Storm’s return? We’re just delaying the inevitable, but I think with Grand Slam Australia still being a ways away, they’re just playing the waiting game, and a feud with Mina will kill some time.

Will Ospreay and Kyle Fletcher put on a hell of a match, definitely the best match of the night. Ospreay is a lock to win Most Outstanding Wrestler this year and Fletcher should be in the running for Most Improved, as while he’s always been good, this was the year he really showed he could be something, and this was the match that proved he should be a player moving forward. And now that AEW has given him the big win, they need to make sure he comes off as a big deal in the future. If they drop this now, it’s on them.

Jay White and Hangman Page had an alright match, but I thought their match at WrestleDream was much better. They went for something different and the crowd just didn’t get into it as much. Not bad at all, but I had a hard time getting into it as well. I think based on the main event angle they will be involved in the World title scene, and I don’t think it’s over between the two just yet..

Mercedes Mone and Kris Statlander had the first great match of the night. I’ve been iffy on both as of late due to their booking, but they put on a hell of a performance on Saturday. I thought Statlander had zero chance of winning heading in and by the end, I was buying the idea that it may actually happen. They are already teasing a Kamille/Mone breakup heavily (it hasn’t even been that long, has it?) so I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re going with that for World’s End.

MJF and Roderick Strong was alright, but the crowd was dead for most of it, which was a theme for a lot of the matches on this show. The storyline between MJF, Strong, Kyle O’Reilly, and Adam Cole just doesn’t resonate with me. It was already an uphill climb after Cole came back as a face and they’ve struggled to get it going ever since. I get they’re holding off the MJF/Cole match to next month, but unless they have a story that actually works I’m hoping that is the end of that story because it’s causing everyone to get less over.

The opening tag match was just kind of there. The crowd was more interested in booing Max Caster, who is clearly teasing a breakup with Anthony Bowens. Probably for the best at this point. Not much more to say other than this feels like a division that needs something because even though Private Party’s title reign is still new, the division feels like it’s just plodding along with no clear direction.